John Collinge

Key facts

• Roles: Professor of Neurology and Director of the MRC Prion Unit and Institute of Prion Diseases at UCL, and Director of the UK National Prion Clinic at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery.
• Career markers: founder Director of the MRC Prion Unit from 1998, of the National Prion Clinic from 2001 and of the UCL Institute of Prion Diseases from 2017; visiting professor at Harvard Medical School since 2017.
• Standing: Fellow of the Royal Society (2005), founder fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, CBE (2004), elected to Academia Europaea in 2026, invited lecture at the Nobel Forum Stockholm in 2024.
• PRN100: a humanised anti-PrP monoclonal antibody from the MRC Prion Unit, given to six UCLH patients with CJD between October 2018 and July 2019; the Lancet Neurology paper (Mead et al., 16 March 2022) reported it was safe and reached the brain, compared against the National Prion Monitoring Cohort (since 2008).
• Unit team: Simon Mead is Clinical Lead of the National Prion Clinic and works at the MRC Prion Unit on clinical trials, genetic factors and antibody treatments.
• Context for the unit's reach: January 2024 news on five cases of Alzheimer's disease believed to be acquired through historic medical treatments; the article was not opened.
• Public statements in the last 12 months on trials, regulation or testing access: none found in the pages read.

Timeline

1. 1998Founder Director of the MRC Prion Unit.
2. 2017Founder Director of the UCL Institute of Prion Diseases.
3. 2018Six UCLH patients begin receiving PRN100 (to July 2019).
4. 2022Lancet Neurology paper on PRN100 first-in-human dosing.
5. 2024Invited lecture at the Nobel Forum, Stockholm.
6. 2026Elected to Academia Europaea.
7. 2026MRC Prion Unit and National Prion Clinic Open Day.
8. 2026Unit news: a cellular traffic controller protein shapes prion disease development.
9. 2026Unit news: study of an acceptance and commitment therapy intervention for people at risk of inherited prion disease.